Otto Witt

Otto Witt was a Swedish Lutheran missionary who travelled to South Africa during the 19th century. During the 1870s, based at Rorke's Drift, he and his daughter Margareta Witt established a predominantly-Zulu mission, with their chief Cetshwayo becoming one of his parishioners. Witt was a pacifist who admired the Zulus and opposed Britain's designs on South Africa, and he was angry when the British Army converted his mission into an outpost during the 1879 Anglo-Zulu War. As the Zulu army approached Rorke's Drift following their victory at the Battle of Isandlwana, Witt persuaded the black Natal Native Contingent soldiers to desert, telling them not to take up arms against their brothers, lest the curse of Abel be upon them. Witt also failed to evacuate the British wounded without the permission of the British commander, Lieutenant John Chard, and his undermining of the British force ultimately led to Chard sending Witt and his daughter out of Rorke's Drift in a carriage.